Washable Workwear Wednesday: Inverness Tie Front Top

This is an interesting top from Athleta. I will be honest, I don’t love any of the ways it is styled on the site, but it has potential to be a good shirt to have in your wardrobe. I like the large cuffs, which make it more stylish, and the longer length, which is good for both wearing tucked and untucked. I also like the roomier shape, which I appreciate in a white top. The top is $74 and is machine washable and dryer friendly. Inverness Tie Front Top

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About April

April is a working mom, a longtime reader of CorporetteMoms, and has been writing our morning fashion advice for working moms since April 2018! She has one child (born 2/17!) and she’s a public interest lawyer in NYC.

Comments

This is so basic but I’m struggling with coming across as too formal — can y’all help me with the wording on an email to quit one of my volunteer obligations? It’s a thing I do at my church once a month and I’m sending the email to the sweet little old church lady who is in charge of the committee (picture someone’s southern grandma).

See also: WHY do I keep saying yes to volunteer obligations?? Someone needs to follow me around and hit me with a rolled up newspaper next time I say yes to something. I’m on two boards, the parent’s council of my kid’s school, in my church choir, and I do this other church activity. And kiddo does swim lessons and ballet. And then I wonder how on earth I never have any free time.

One suggestion on the saying yes front: When I am asked whether I can do something – work, volunteer or even my Ex, my default response is now, “I will think about that and get back to you.” I feel so much pressure to say yes when first asked, and this response gives me a chance to take a breath, think about it, and many times, go back with a “no.”

I think being very sincere is always the best with these types of emails. Start with expressing gratitude for what you’ve learned and the relationships you’ve built, then talk about your own struggles with time (not in a braggy “omg I am so busy” way but in a sincere way, talking about your family and priorities. Something like “it is so important to me to spend quality time with my family and lately I’ve felt like I barely see them, which has been sad for all of us. I’ve taken a hard look at my schedule and I think I need to step back on a few obligations, including this one.” Then finish up by offering to help find a replacement or with the transition. She will understand — especially if you are honest and admit some vulnerability.

I hope your week is going well! I wanted to get in touch because I unfortunately can’t volunteer on Saturdays any more. I’ve really enjoyed it and I wish I had more time, but I just can’t make it work in my schedule right now. [Optional: Let me know if you’d like help asking around at church to find someone else to fill in.]

I close on my new house next Friday!! So excited! As I plan for this next house, I REALLY want to get new bedroom furniture and a new bed. Currently, I have a king-sized bed, and I think I’m going to move to a queen. The king can be nice if, for some reason, a kid ends up in the bed with me. The 5 year old has been sneaking over around 3am for the past few nights, and it is nice to have so much room that she doesn’t wake me up. However, a king sized bed feels unnecessary now. Any reason to keep a king-sized bed? Also any recommendations on mattresses (Casper or otherwise)?

What is your reasoning behind downsizing? Aside from less bedding to wash/bedding is less expensive to buy. If I had the room to carry on with a king-sized bed, I think I would. For me, at least, it would be hard to give up the possibility of extra space!

Congrats and good luck with the closing!
We recently replaced our mattress and went with tulo, and the experience was fantastic. It’s a bed-in-a-box like Casper, but was delivered like a regular mattress, so the old one was taken away along with all of the packing material. We also liked being able to try it in a store, but DH is very picky about firmness levels, so that may be a step you can skip.

I’m trying to decide if I should try and switch jobs – or if the problem is actually me! About 4 years ago, I moved to a unicorn type job as a government attorney that was supposed to be good hours, good pay, and interesting work. I have two kids under 4, and a spouse that is a partner in a firm (works 50+ hrs a week, but not big law hours). Although my spouse is very supportive of my career, I don’t think it makes sense to prioritize my job when my salary will always be a fraction of spouse’s income. This is 100% my decision, and spouse has made it clear we will hire all the help we need for me to work the hours I need. However, I don’t want to!
With my current job, the division of case load is not very balanced. So while the job is good pay (again, for govt), the hours are creeping up. I currently work about 45 hours a week. Looking at my future caseload, I anticipate that I will need to work 45-50 hrs most weeks through next summer to keep up. A friend that is also a former coworker suggested that this was probably partly my own doing. In short, she (correctly and kindly) pointed out that I am not good at promoting myself and my work. I keep my head down and do my assignments, where many of my coworkers spend a significant amount of time trying to appear that they are super busy in an effort to avoid work. Since I am efficient and not complaining, I get more work.
I am currently being heavily recruited for a different position in government. Same type of position, slightly different area of law, same pay, different leadership. I’m being lead to believe that the hours will be much better for the most part – some occasional OT for crunch times and some travel (which all is scheduled far in advance). My fear is that this new unicorn job will also turn into a donkey. My former coworker suggested I have more personal capital where I am, and that I should work on fixing the balance of my work load at my current job. I also happen to know that my boss at my current job is moving on, and the person next in line for the boss position isn’t likely to make fixing my work load a priority.
The easiest thing to do is to stay put. I know there is not crystal ball, but what should I be focusing on in making this decision? My priority is to stay in government, and work 40 hours (or less). I have also been recruited for jobs in the corporate world that would require longer hours – but would also mean higher pay. I’m not interested in that at this time, but may be a possibility when my kids are much older.

Can you just drop the ball on things or be slower to get them done? Do what you can with 40 hours a week, and if things slip or someone has to wait an extra week for you to turn something around — oh well, you did the best you could in the time you had.

For things where there’s not deadline flexibility, is there quality flexibility? Could you proofread something one less time or submit something that works even if you know it could be better? I’m not talking about malpractice, obviously, but there does get to be a point of diminishing returns in legal drafting, and you can ALWAYS work on things longer because getting something “right” is so amorphous and subjective.

My advice would be to just limit your hours to 40 a week. Leave things on your desk un-done. If someone asks about something, say, “Sorry, I’ve been too busy to get to that,” especially since it sounds like that’s what your colleagues do. Make your default that you’re only working 40 hours per week, so if someone asks, “Hey, do you have time to do X?” say honestly, “Unfortunately, I really don’t right now,” if you can. Get into the mindset that if doing something requires you to work 45-50 hours per week, *you don’t have time to do it*.

I agree with this. I think you’re going to have to enforce your own works hours because, in my experience, the only time a job will do that for you is if you’re hourly and not salaried. I am the same way as you, OP, in that I don’t go on and on about how busy I am and just keep my head down and try to do good work and I just end up with more work because people think I’m fine and handling it.

Yes, you need to be your own gatekeeper. I negotiated at 1500 billable hour requirement at my firm after my child was born (as opposed to 1800). I mainly practice in IP prosecution and other transactional IP work, which affords me a lot of ability to set my schedule and stick to it. My boss is totally fine with my arrangement, but sometimes other partners don’t understand why I wouldn’t want to work 24/7. I worked with one particularly rough partner who’d call on Friday and expect a 20 hour project by Monday. I consistently said no because (1) the partner usually sat on something for weeks before giving it to me, and (2) I had my boss’s blessing (see number 1). Will that prevent me from doing work with that partner going forward? Probably. Is that a good thing? Absolutely.

This has been my experience in government as well. Because many bosses prioritize high quality work product, they are hesitant to give important projects to mediocre attorneys. Bosses also face intense obstacles when attempting to fire mediocre employees who are meeting their performance standards. But they can’t hire new talent to tackle the workload because they are paying the mediocre employees. This means that the top performers get most of the cases, leading to a pressure on the top performers to work more than 40 hours per week and limit vacation time. In my case (perhaps because my husband is not a law firm partner), the position is still a good fit, and the hours are still better than private practice.

I agree that you need to be your own gatekeeper, but IME, going from the one who does more than their share to one who says no (even if objectively doing more than their share) hurts the person’s reputation. Personally, if you are interested in the other job, I would go for it and work on enforcing boundaries from the start.

While on the phone with my dad, “Redux had to work, so I was home alone the first two days.” I did have to work, so I went in early and busted my butt to get stuff done, used PTO to get home by 1pm both days so I could have lunch with her and spend the afternoon together.

“I don’t mind that we didn’t do anything special during my visit.” I took two days completely off (PTO) and on one of those days we visited a cultural site about 40 minutes from our house, including the associated museum, then went out for ice cream. Plus my kid’s dance recital, celebratory lunch, picnic with friends, special desserts, etc. over the course of her stay. She should see our regular life!

Good thought– it’s true that my dad can’t travel, so he probably does feel bummed. Though the second comment was to me, not to my dad, so it doesn’t apply there. I said nothing, of course, just gets under my skin how hard I worked to make her visit special and she saw it as “nothing special” in her words!

Hugs, and commiseration. My parents (mother, really) seems to have amnesia about working now that they are retired. A decade plus ago (pre-kids, pre-retirement) my mother literally ‘was too busy’ to take my calls at work and routinely worked late/on weekends/etc. My weekends as a child were always filled with her taking home work/doing schoolwork for her advanced degrees and maaaaybe one or two activities for us kids fit into adult work/chores/etc. This isn’t a bad thing! It showed me that adults lives didn’t revolve around me and modeled working motherhood.
BUT she now apparently has ‘no idea’ how I’m so busy and can’t possibly understand how I ‘need’ to work nights/weekends and why I can’t chat throughout the day/text incessantly/doesn’t understand why we’re so busy with family stuff and chores on the weekends. Shrug. I ignore it, chalk it up to rose-tinted glasses, and limit interactions when I’m really tetchy. I also vent to my husband friends who are in similar boats with retired parents!

I have the opposite situation. My mom was a SAHM and now is a SAHG (caregiver for my nephew) and one of those very busy homemaker types– house always clean, meals always fresh, PTa volunteer, etc. When I mentioned something about how our cleaning lady had just been there the day before she said, “lucky you.” Which she actually earnestly means– she wishes she had a cleaning lady!– but it comes across as so snarky. We have talked about how different our mother lives are and I know she is truly amazed at how we make it all work, but it reads pretty judgy. I am very proud of how gracious I acted, but will quietly stew about it for months.

That entitled attitude is so annoying, and it seems to be really common in the older generation. Why is it not sufficient, when visiting someone, to see them around their work hours? Why do some people think that you need to be actively having a conversation in order be spending meaningful time together? Isn’t part of what’s nice about family is that you can just exist in each other’s space and enjoy one another’s presence for awhile? I realize it’s hard to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, but I think about visiting my daughters when they are adults, and if they let us stay in their home and spend time with us outside of work hours, I feel like that would be totally fine.

Not to mention, with parents, I feel like the dynamic is often that they want to visit more than their kids want them to visit, so if they don’t want to visit on the terms set out by the child (i.e., I have to work during the day but can see you in the evenings), they should just not come!

On the other extreme, both my mother and my in-laws are primarily looking for time with their granddaughter and don’t care too much about whether or not they see us at the same time. Sure, they like us well enough, but grown-up kids are just not as much fun as a grandkid.

Yeah, I mean on the one hand I get it– she flew across the country to see us, not to spend time alone, so maybe it’s disappointing that we just kept living our lives including kids in daycare and adults at work. But on the other hand, if she wanted to keep the kids home from daycare while we worked, we would’ve happily done that. But she doesn’t like to drive here (although she is perfectly capable) and she didn’t offer, so… We ask for and get one night of babysitting to go out to dinner to celebrate DH’s birthday, so that was nice. Of course she probably thought that was rude of us…

I don’t know if this is part of the issue, but I find my parents often have a lot of unvoiced expectations when they visit (and in general, hah). So I find myself guessing as to what they want to do for dinner, etc. But when I try to plan in advance (including neutrally asking if/when they want me to pull my kid from childcare for them to get alone time w/her), it feels abrupt/rude. It makes visits much less stressful to know these kinds of things in advance with my work schedule.

Sounds like this may be OBE, but I’m a big fan of buying playsets used on Craigslist or other site and then hiring a company to move them from the current owner’s house to yours. The price is usually a fraction of buying brand new, and you can find them in very good shape. YMMV.

Think of it as a joint expense. And it’s an investment in both of your future earning potential. And compounding retirement growth. And a back-up for health insurance. I could go on and on, but unless you really want to stay home (and have planned on contingencies if something happens to your spouse’s job), then don’t compare just your take-home salary and current childcare expenses.

I’m sorry about the meager increase. It can’t hurt to look around at other options.

One of the most helpful things that I’ve done for my own working mom sanity is to join a hobby-related facebook group that is mostly filled with SAHMs. It is one of those close up views about how NOT-greener the grass is on that side.

If raises are crappy, now might be a good time to look elsewhere or get some additional education. Or accept that your current salary pays for a standard of living and work life balance that is meaningful to you. Or try to feel really noble about how you’re making sacrifices for the betterment of your family.

ALSO, my husband and I have taken turns being financially dependent on the other and it was a complete disaster for our relationship and a highlight reel of each of our worst qualities (it was also a long time ago, and I would hope we would handle it more gracefully today but it was suuuuch a $h*tshow). Money is power. Being able to leave is power. Being able to take care of yourself is power. Being able to find another job is power. Don’t give that away without thinking long and hard.

Yes, it’s totally okay. Think about everything included in your entire compensation/benefits package: what’s your retirement plan like? How’s the health insurance? Is there an HSA? Is there a dependent care FSA? Are there any additional benefits you take advantage of (gym reimbursement, discounted life insurance, etc.)? Those items all factor into your compensation beyond your monthly salary.

Also, think about working as another form of insurance against life’s worst possibilities (i.e. the death or divorce of your current partner). Think about the long-term benefits of staying in the workplace. Like a previous comment said, what will you be earning in 5-10 years because you stayed?

Lastly, it’s okay to work because you enjoy it and it’s good for your mental health. If you were a SAHM, you’d probably end up spending money on a special outside hobby or class or something else to give you that mental stimulation and time away from your kids. You’re just choosing to invest in your career instead, which has the added benefits listed above beyond a cycling class or a painting workshop.

One way to think about it is like this: You earn $0 either way so take the money out of the equation. Now just ask yourself what you get by working vs. what you would get by staying home. That’s your answer.

Awesome framing. This is in a way more helpful than the “Think of childcare costs of coming from both your and your husband’s salary, there’s no need to think of it as just yours,” but that’s not realistic. To me it’s more helpful to admit, okay, I’m earning $0 net, but given that would also be the case if I stayed home, which should I do? It’s not that staying home wins by default if there isn’t offsetting income. Very well said.

Kind of piggybacking on the discussion yesterday about flaking friends – what are your strategies for finding new friends? Do you just start asking other moms at day care for play dates? Join a yoga class? Running group? This seems like it should be easy but I’m struggling a bit. We’re currently renting in the suburbs. I think it will be easier once we buy a house and sort of establish a neighborhood.

I have gotten pretty close with some of my coworkers, and I made a few friends (maybe more acquaintances) through my mom’s group. We’re also moving to the suburbs soon, so I’m guessing we will meet people through our kids’ schools and other activities.

At this stage in my life, I’m happy with just meeting people who I can share various parts of my life with (work, kids, kids’ school) and I’m not looking for a lifelong bestie. I have a few really good friends from law school who I still stay in touch with, and we’re in similar stages of life, which is nice. Plus my husband. That’s enough for me right now.

It might help to ask yourself what kind of friends you want. Someone you can get a drink with on a Tuesday night after a tough day? Someone with kids of similar ages who can come over for a long Saturday playdate? Someone who you can go on double dates with? I feel like all of those would require different “looking” strategies — we moved here a year and a half ago and i’ve had the best luck finding “playdate friends” by talking to other parents at daycare. Tuesday drink friends are mostly people I met via work (and my favorite of them doesn’t have kids, which is actually really nice!). And our double date friends are people who live down the street.

I joined a local mom’s group, which has been nice for playdate friends and commiserating over various stages of baby- and toddler-hood. Most of these moms stay home or work in social work/teaching/physical therapy/etc so we don’t align on career stuff as much.

I also joined a m*eetup group that was intended as a way to meet non-mom friends, and while the official group eventually stopped meeting I have stayed close with a few of the women (some moms and some not) – those I am close with are most similar to me career-wise. This is the Tuesday night drinks crew for me.

I have become casually friendly with people at yoga and church, still at acquaintance level for now.

I’ve also had luck being introduced to friends of friends who have just moved to my city.

For me it’s been about striking up conversations everywhere: daycare, swim lessons, the park, etc. I’m naturally more on the extroverted end of the spectrum so it is relatively easy for me, but if you are head down, I’m-just-here-to-get-my-child, I’m not likely to talk to you. But I really do think, more often than not, families want other like-minded families to hang out with so you don’t have anything to lose by going out on a limb and inviting another family over for dinner. The kids can play and the adults can chat.

I have a mom’s FB group that I am friendly with over the net but most are SAHM or work part-time or freelance, so midday or even 5PM meetups (I didn’t even know this was a thing – 5PM yoga class, park time, etc.) don’t work for my 60+ hour a week schedule, but at least having a friendly supportive sounding board of people in my community with whom I could meet up with is mentally reassuring to me. Most of my new friends in the last 10 years are either work colleagues (some former some current) or spouses of my husband’s friends – some of whom I like better than he probably likes his friends (we met and married in our 30s, so each had an independent group of friends). A couple of times a year I like to invite someone with whom I am friendly but not super close (but think there might be potential) to either work networking events (if I can find a business basis) or to parties we host (summer BBQ, Friendsgiving, that sort of thing). If it’s a disaster, they’re just one of many, but if they come and it goes well, it starts building those connections outside of whatever context we initially met. DH made a “dad friend” at the gym because he was sitting by the pool observing his kids’ swim classes at the same time DH was doing swim class with our kiddo. DH could talk to (and would probably enjoy talking to) a wall though, so I think it’s much easier for him to make new friends than it is for my introverted self (I would never speak to someone I didn’t know at the gym and would strongly prefer not to be spoken to while working out, for example).

Those of you who car camp with kids, what tent do you use? We have a four person tent currently but I’m thinking we really need a six person to be comfortable especially as LO is still in the PnP. Deciding how much of an investment to make – this will be our first year camping as a family of 3, but I hope that it will be a tradition we keep up!

We use a four-person backpacking tent for our family of three, and have been doing so ever since we started camping with our kid when she was three or four years old. It just fits our three sleeping bags in a row with some room at our feet for duffel bags and gear. For your first outing, I’d just use the tent you already have and see how it works. You can always upgrade before your next trip. FWIW, the smaller the tent, the easier it is to find a nice flat spot to pitch it. We also like that our small tent is easy to pack in our small car or on an airplane.

We have not camped with kids yet, but I did a lot of camping pre-kids, and for car camping (where you’re not carrying all your gear so space and weight aren’t at a premium), definitely recommend getting a tent rated for about 2 people more than you are planning to use it for. Growing up, once we were a little older like elementary, we had one with dividers for 2-3 “rooms” which was great for privacy at those ages (and didn’t make the tent huge, just adddd a curtain basically). Tents can last a long time so I’d spend to get something quality like kelty and plan to use it for years. For longevity, make sure to use the drop cloth under it or a tarp if it doesn’t come with one.

We have the biggest tent that Costco sells, sized for 8-10 persons. It’s a Coleman brand (which I’ve had good luck with for years) and it has a sleeping area and a separate screened porch area. It is invaluable in buggy areas or when it’s raining and you can’t go out. Great to sit and have a drink while reading in lawn chairs plus it’s extra storage room. For me, having the second room is priceless. It’s almost like camping in a small cabin.

We just bought this tent: CORE 10 Person Straight walled tent from a*azon. We won’t use it for a few more weeks, but we are the same as you – 3 people, 1 in a PnP. Backpackers (including my husband) say it’s overkill, but I don’t care. The straight walls are amazing – you can stand up straight almost everywhere in the tent – no hunching over. And it fits queen air mattresses easily, and I think it will be great for camping trips with friends and sleepovers in the future.

4 person REI brand backpacking tent with good vestibules. We’re a family of 4–kids are toddler and preschooler. I love it. It’s small enough that I can set it up/take down on my own, if necessary. Has enough room for all of us to sleep on camping mats, and kids like to snuggle us, so it’s not like more room would be helpful. I aspire to backpacking with the kids someday, so we’ll use it for that.

Thanks all – especially for the specific recommendations. I’m still torn, maybe will do a little more research of my own. Our current tent is over 10 years old, and we’ve gotten plenty of use out of it, so I wouldn’t feel terrible getting a bigger one if we really need it.